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States and union territories of India
|category = Federated state |territory = Republic of India |start_date = |current_number =29 States 7 Union territories |number_date = |population_range = States: 607,688 Sikkim – 199,581,477 Uttar Pradesh Union Territories: 64,429 Lakshadweep – 11,007,835 National Capital Territory |area_range = States: Goa – Rajasthan Union territories: Lakshadweep – Andaman and Nicobar Islands |government = State government, Union Government (Union territories) |subdivision = District, Divisions }} India is a federal union of states comprising twenty-nine states and seven union territories. The states and union territories are further subdivided into districts and further into smaller administrative divisions. Responsibilities and authorities The Constitution of India distributes the sovereign powers exercisable with respect to the territory of any State between the Union and that State. "Article 73 broadly stated, provides that the executive power of the Union shall extend to the matters with respect to which Parliament has power to make laws. Article 162 similarly provides that the executive power of a State shall extend to the matters with respect to which the Legislature of a State has power to make laws. The Supreme Court has reiterated this position when it ruled in the Ramanaiah case that the executive power of the Union or of the State broadly speaking, is coextensive and coterminous with its respective legislative power." (italics in original)Territoriality of executive powers of states in India, Balwant Singh Malik, Constitutional Law, 1998 History Pre-Independence The Indian Subcontinent has been ruled by many different ethnic groups throughout its history, each instituting their own policies of administrative division in the region. During the British Raj, the original administrative structure was mostly kept, and India was divided into provinces (also called Presidencies) that were directly governed by the British and princely states which were nominally controlled by a local prince or raja loyal to the British Empire, who held de facto sovereignty (suzerainty) over the princely states. 1947-56 Between 1947 and 1950, the territories of the princely states were politically integrated into the Indian Union. Most were merged into existing provinces; others were organised into new provinces, such as Rajputana, Himachal Pradesh, Madhya Bharat, and Vindhya Pradesh, made up of multiple princely states; a few, including Mysore, Hyderabad, Bhopal, and Bilaspur, became separate provinces. The Government of India Act 1935 remained the constitutional law of India pending adoption of a new Constitution. The new Constitution of India, which came into force on 26 January 1950, made India a sovereign democratic republic. The new republic was also declared to be a "Union of States". The constitution of 1950 distinguished between three main types of states: * Part A states, which were the former governors' provinces of British India, were ruled by an elected governor and state legislature. The nine Part A states were Assam, Bihar, Bombay, Madhya Pradesh (formerly Central Provinces and Berar), Madras, Orissa, Punjab (formerly East Punjab), Uttar Pradesh (formerly the United Provinces), and West Bengal. * The eight Part B states were former princely states or groups of princely states, governed by a rajpramukh, who was usually the ruler of a constituent state, and an elected legislature. The rajpramukh was appointed by the President of India. The Part B states were Hyderabad, Jammu and Kashmir, Madhya Bharat, Mysore, Patiala and East Punjab States Union (PEPSU), Rajasthan, Saurashtra, and Travancore-Cochin. * The ten Part C states included both the former chief commissioners' provinces and some princely states, and each was governed by a chief commissioner appointed by the President of India. The Part C states were Ajmer, Bhopal, Bilaspur, Coorg, Delhi, Himachal Pradesh, Cutch, Manipur, Tripura, and Vindhya Pradesh. The sole Part D state was the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, which were administered by a lieutenant governor appointed by the central government. Post-1956 Several new states and union territories have been created out of existing states since 1956. Bombay State was split into the linguistic states of Gujarat and Maharashtra on 1 May 1960J.C. Aggarwal and S.P. Agrawal, editors, Uttarakhand: Past, Present, and Future (New Delhi: Concept Publishing, 1995), p89-90 by the Bombay Reorganisation Act. Nagaland was made a state on 1 December 1963.Nagaland History & Geography-Source india.gov.in The Punjab Reorganisation Act of 1966 divided the Punjab along linguistic lines, creating a new Hindi-speaking state of Haryana on 1 November,The Punjab Reorganisation Act 1966 transferring the northern districts of Punjab to Himachal Pradesh, and designating Chandigarh, the shared capital of Punjab and Haryana, a union territory. Statehood was conferred upon Himachal Pradesh on 25 January 1971, Manipur, Meghalaya and TripuraSnapshot of North Eastern States on 21 January 1972. The Kingdom of Sikkim joined the Indian Union as a state on 26 April 1975. In 1987, Arunachal Pradesh and Mizoram became states on 20 February, followed by Goa on 30 May, while Goa's northern exclaves of Daman and Diu became a separate union territory.Goa Chronology In 2000 three new states were created; Chhattisgarh (1 November 2000) was created out of eastern Madhya Pradesh, Uttaranchal (9 November 2000), which was renamed Uttarakhand in 2007, |accessdate= }} was created out of the Hilly regions of northwest Uttar Pradesh, and Jharkhand (15 November 2000) was created out of the southern districts of Bihar. In 2014, the new state of Telangana was carved out from the North-Western regions of the state of Andhra Pradesh. Hyderabad became the joint capital of the two states for the period not exceeding 10 years. Current proposals See List of proposed states and territories of India List of states and union territories States * Andhra Pradesh was divided into two states, Telangana and a residual Andhra Pradesh on . Hyderabad, located entirely within the borders of Telangana, is to serve as joint capital for both states for a period of time not exceeding ten years. Union territories See also * Adjectivals and demonyms for states and territories of India * Autonomous regions of India * Emblems of Indian States * ISO 3166-2:IN * List of states and union territories of India by population * List of states in India by past population * List of Indian state and union territory name etymologies * Subdivisions of India Notes References External links * Maps of the Historical Territorial Evolution of the States of India * Official Government of India website: States and Union Territories States and terrtories India 1 States, India Category:India-related lists Category:States and territories of India